Geoffrey Chaucer Online:
The Electronic Canterbury Tales

Daniel T. Kline | U of Alaska Anchorage | Chaucer Pedagogy | CV | What's New?  | Revision History

Web Resources by Tale 

Electronic Canterbury Tales - Kankedort.Net Index Page

Fragment I / Group A
The General Prologue
The Knight's Tale
The Miller's Prologue & Tale
The Reeve's Prologue & Tale
The Cook's Prologue & Tale

Fragment II / Group B1
The Man of Law's Introduction, Prologue, Tale, & Epilogue

Fragment III / Group D
The Wife of Bath's Prologue & Tale
The Friar's Prologue & Tale
The Summoner's Prologue & Tale

Fragment IV / Group E
The Clerk's Prologue & Tale
The Merchant's Prologue, Tale, & Epilogue
 
Fragment V / Group F
The Squire's Introduction & Tale
The Franklin's Prologue & Tale

Fragment VI / Group C
The Physician's Tale
The Pardoner's Introduction, Prologue, & Tale

Fragment VII / Group B2
The Shipman's Tale
The Prioress's Prologue & Tale
The Prologue & Tale of Sir Thopas
The Tale of Melibee
The Monk's Prologue & Tale
The Nun's Priest's Prologue,
Tale, & Epilogue
 
Fragment VIII / Group G
The Second Nun's Prologue & Tale
The Canon's Yeoman's Prologue & Tale

Fragment IX / Group H 
The Manciple's Prologue & Tale

Fragment X / Group I
The Parson's Prologue & Tale
The Retraction

The Electronic Canterbury Tales:

Troilus and Criseyde

Additional Chaucer Pages in The Electronic Canterbury Tales

Chaucer the Pilgrim-Narrator & Author

Chaucer's "Orphan" Pilgrims - Those without a Tale

The Frame Tale, Later Continuations,
& Chaucerian Apocrypha

Manuscripts, Printed Editions, & Electronic Texts

Electronic Chaucer Texts:
What's Available Online?

Chaucer in / and Popular Culture

Troilus and Criseyde

Documentation Primer

Chaucer Pedagogy Page

Related Schools, Programs, and Local & Regional Organizations

• Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies

• Chaucernet Archives, a searchable archive of the Chaucernet academic listserv, dating from September 1995 until the present.

• Delaware Valley Medieval Association

• International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA)

• International Medieval Institute, University of Leeds

• The Lollard Society

• The Medieval Academy of America (MAA), the granddaddy of medieval organizations in the US, is entering the new century with a new attitude.

• Medieval Academy of America: Committee on Centers and Regional Associations compiles data on North American (and external) medieval centers, programs, committees, libraries, and regional associations.

• Medieval Association of the Pacific

• Medieval Institute at Western Michigan University (Kalamazoo)

• Medieval and Renaissance Drama Society

• New Chaucer Society provides a forum for teachers and scholars of Geoffrey Chaucer and his age, sponsors a biennial conference, and a number of publishing projects.

• Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies (U of Toronto)

• Society for Medieval Feminist Scholarship

• Spanish Society for Medieval English Language and Literature (SELIM)

• Society for Medieval Languages and Linguistics

• Society for the Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages

• TEAMS: The Consortium for the Teaching of the Middle Ages

• Texas Medieval Association

• UCLA Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies

The Single Best Site for Online Term Paper & College Essay

• The Purdue University OWL (Online Writing Lab)

See especially the Purdue OWL publications:

• The MLA Style Guide
• The APA Style Guide

Schools, Programs, and Local & Regional Organizations

• Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies

• Delaware Valley Medieval Association

• International Center of Medieval Art (ICMA)

• International Medieval Institute, University of Leeds

• The Lollard Society

• Medieval Association of the Pacific

• Medieval Institute at Western Michigan University (Kalamazoo)

• Medieval and Renaissance Drama Society

• Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies (U of Toronto)

• Spanish Society for Medieval English Language and Literature (SELIM)

• Texas Medieval Association

• UCLA Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies

  Journal & Newsletter Homepages

• Æstel: A Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies
• Arthuriana
• Chaucer Review
• Chaucer Yearbook
• Comitatus: A Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies
• Disputatio: An International Transdisciplinary Journal of the Late Middle Ages
• Envoi: A Review Journal of Medieval Literature
• Essays in Medieval Studies: Proceedings of the Illinois Medieval Association
• Exemplaria
• In Parentheses: Papers in Medieval Studies
• Medieval English Studies Newsletter
• Medieval Feminist Newsletter
• The Medieval Review
• New Medieval Literatures
• Nottingham Medieval Studies
• Speculum
• Studies in the Age of Chaucer
• Viator: Medieval and Renaissance Studies
• Yearbook of Langland Studies

Chaucernet: 
An Academic Listserv (from Edwin Duncan, Towson U)

• What is Chaucernet

• How to Subscribe

• Listserve Commands

• Laura Hodges' "Netiquette" for Chaucernet

• Chaucernet Archives

An Online Compendium and Companion 
to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales

1.  In Middle English

The Words of the Host to the Prioress, the Prioress's Prologue, and the Prioress's Tale at the UVa Electronic Text Center.

Read the Prioress's Prologue and Tale in the context of Fragment VII - Group B2.

2.  In Modern English Translation

Scott Gettman's edition of the Canterbury Tales (Electronic Literature Foundation) is accessible by individual tale & available in a variety of formats:  Middle English, Modern English, Facing Page, & Interpolated - Glossed (frames; from unknown base text).

• Although unsuitable for formal research or college work, the ELF is the best online version for younger readers and those unfamiliar with Middle English. Easily navigable, and the Middle English glosses are very helpful.

The Litrix Reading Room translation of the Canterbury Tales features rhyming couplets.

Sinan Kökbugur's helpfully glossed hypertext Middle English rendition of the complete Canterbury Tales is available at the Librarius page. Use the Table of Contents in the left frame to click on a specific Tale, and difficult terms and phrases are glossed in the lower frame. 

3.  Historical & Cultural Backgrounds

See Julia Bolton Holloway's original research, for as she says, "Poor Second Nun! Who thus becomes a true saint! Chaucer and his wife were honoured by the city of Norwich. Norwich and Lincoln shared in the blood libel tale Chaucer has the Prioress tell. Benedictine Carrow Priory, just outside Norwich walls, had just such a Prioress, who in Julian's time even harboured a murderer. I did a study of it, visited the remains, just the terribly grand Tudor house left that a later Prioress had built for herself there, and this research is on the web. What could help too is the essay on Julian and Judaism, as well as the essay on the Prioress and the Second Nun."

The Prioress's Tale evidences one of the most pernicious aspects of medieval culture: Its pervasive antisemitism. So, the tale explicitly invokes the multifaceted relationship of Christianity and Judaism.  Part of Paul Halsall's extensive Internet Medieval Source Book, the Internet Jewish History Source Book houses an extensive collection of primary sources related to the Jewish Middle Ages. Some of the extensive listing of documents under Christian Anti-Semitism / Latin Christianity, relating specifically to England include (lightly edited): 

• Gerald of Wales: Barnacle Geese Should Convince the Jew of the Immaculate Conception, 1188.
• Image: Jewish Usurers, from the Rotulus Judeorum, 1233
  An English caricature of Jews as coinclippers and and usurers.
• Thomas of Monmouth: The Life and Miracles of St. William of Norwich (excerpts), 1144. "One of the major accusations against Jews of the charge that they killed Christian children. This blood-libel was the center of a number of saint's cults. See the Catholic Encylopedia [1913] article William of Norwich for much background information. [Note that this article, while rejecting the Ritual Murder and Blood Libels, does end by suggesting that some of the cases were based on real incidents.]"
• The Abbey of St. Edmund’s and the Jews, 1173-1182
• Roger of Hoveden: Persecution of Jews Following Coronation of Richard I, 1189.
• Ephraim of Bonn: On the York Massacre of 1189-90. 

Continental and Papal pronouncements include:

• Ralph Glaber: The Year 1000 AD, from the Miracles de Saint-Benoit, (d.c. 1044) - discusses early 11th century anti-semitism.
• Soloman bar Samson: The Crusaders in Mainz, 1096. 
• Innocent III: Letter on the Jews - toleration, 1199. 
• Innocent III: Constitution for the Jews - toleration, 1199. 
• The Fourth Lateran Council: Canon 68 - on Jews.
• Pope Innocent III: The Keeping of Slaves by the Jews, 1204
• Gregory X  (r.1271-1276): Letter on the Jews 
• Martin V: From Declaration on Protection for the Jews, 1419. 
• Anti-Semitic Legends, Translated and/or edited by D. L. Ashliman, [At Pitt]

• Gilbert Crispin: Disputation of a Jew with a Christian about the Christian Faith, before 1096
• Anselm of Canterbury: How to Treat a Convert, before 1100
• Contact between English Jews and Christians: Two Twelfth-century Views
• An Israelite Bishop without Guile, c. 1168
• Gerald of Wales: A Witty Jew, c. 1185
• Henry II of England: Concerning Loans From The Jews
• The Expulsion of the Jews from France, 1182 (Account by Rigord from the Gesta Philippi Augusti).
• Richard I of England: Charter by Which Many Liberties are Granted and Confirmed to the Jews, 22 March, 1190
• English Jewry is Organised: The Ordinances of the Jews, 1194
• Appointment of an Archpriest of the Jews in England, July 1199 
• King John of England and the Jews: Charters, c.1201

Music figures prominently in the plot of the Prioress's Tale.  See Gary Rich's sublime Ars Subtilior. Music of the late Medieval period and the generous list of links there.

4.  Sources, Analogues, & Related Texts

TEAMS Middle English Text Series (Russell Peck, URochester) houses a number of lesser known and hard to find medieval texts in helpful student editions. A generous and fascinating selection not to be missed! Each selection includes a scholarly introduction and full notes. Some of the selections related to the Prioress's Tale include:

• Middle English Marian Lyrics (ed. Karen Saupe), 
  Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 1999.
  • Introduction (Karen Saupe)
  • Poems in Celebration of Mary
• The Book of Margery Kempe (ed. Lynn Staley), Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 1996.
  • Introduction (Lynn Staley)
  • Prologue and Book I, Chapters 1-44
  • Book I, Chapters 45-89
  • Book II

"All TEAMS texts are under copyright, whether in hard copy or in electronic form. The on-line texts provided here are meant for individual use only. To download and make multiple copies for course use, you must have permission from the managing editor of Medieval Institute Publications."

Read an associated tale from the Life of William of Norwich (12th century), whose death was also blamed on the "blood libel" legend--the anti-Semitic belief that Jews kidnapped and killed Christian children for illicit purposes.

D. L. Ashliman provides a number of anti-Semitic folktales from around Europe, medieval and modern, on his Anti-Semitic Legends. A number of these are translated from 19th century German sources. You might also like to see the folktales of the Singing Bones, wherein the body parts of murder victims cry out or sing for justice.

Harvard Classics (vol. 40), English Poetry I, From Chaucer to Gray reproduces a number of traditional (and some) medieval ballads, including Hugh of Lincoln

The Oxford Book of Ballads, ed. Arthur Quiller-Couch (1910) includes dozens of traditional (and some medieval) ballads, including some that bear upon themes in the Prioress's Tale:

• The Innocents
• The Twelve Good Joys
• Hugh of Lincoln
• St. Stephen and King Herod

5.  Online Notes & Commentary

Discussion and links concerning the Prioress's Prologue and Tale on Larry D. Benson's superlative Geoffrey Chaucer Page (Harvard). Includes e-texts of scholarly essays, sources and ancillary texts, and capsule discussions of key issues.  Some of the items related to the Prioress's Tale include:

• General Note on the Prioress's Tale
• From the Vernon manuscript, "The Boy Murdered in Paris" (analogue)
• Jean de Meun's Romance of the Rose:  Duenna's Advice on Table Manners (see the Prioress's Portrait)

See a number of related Tales of the Virgin from the 12th and 13th Century (Paul Halsall, IMSB).

Read articles on figures related to the Prioress's Tale from the 1913 ed. of the Catholic Encyclopedia:

• Holy Innocents / Childermass
• Hugh of Lincoln
• William of Norwich

6.  Online Books & Articles

The Google Library Project has made a number of venerable older (and out of copyright) works available as fully downloadable (and quite large) .pdf files. These include:

• Skeat, W.W., ed. The Prioresses Tale, Sire Thopas, the Monkes Tale, the Clerkes Tale, the Squieres Tale. (Oxford, 1880).

While these older works are vitally important for their historical value and their place in the development of the history of Chaucerian criticism, they should be supplemented with current textual and critical studies.

A number of titles from the U of California Press's E-Scholarship initiative deal with anti-Semitism and the legacy of Christian - Jewish (and Muslim) relations in the medieval and early modern period, especially in Spain.  See the following: 

• Bar-Kochva, Bezalel. Pseudo-Hecataeus on the Jews: Legitmizing the Jewish Diaspora. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1997). 
• Burns, Robert I., S. J. Jews in the Notarial Culture: Latinate Wills in Mediterranean Spain, 1250–1350. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1996). 
• Chazan, Robert. Daggers of Faith: Thirteenth-Century Christian Missionizing and Jewish Response. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1991). 
• Chazan, Robert. European Jewry and the First Crusade. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1987). 
• Chazan, Robert. God, Humanity, and History: The Hebrew First Crusade Narratives. (Berkeley: U of California P, 2000). 
• Chazan, Robert. Medieval Stereotypes and Modern Antisemitism. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1997). 
• Cohen, Jeremy. Living Letters of the Law: Ideas of Jews in Medieval Christianity. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1999). 
• Meyerson, Mark D. The Muslims of Valencia in the Age of Fernando and Isabel. (Berkeley: U of California P, 1991). 

The articles from Cultural Frictions: Medieval Cultural Studies in Post-Modern Contexts Conference Proceedings (27-28 October 1995) are online.  Though not about the Prioress's Tale, the following article deals with some of the same issues of anti-Semitism and violence:

• Steven F. Kruger, "Medieval Christian (Dis)identifications: Muslims and Jews in Guibert of Nogent." Cite as a web document.

Essays in Medieval Studies features full-text articles from the proceedings of the Illinois Medieval Association, online version edited by Allen J. Frantzen (Loyola - Chicago), including:

• Dealing with the same type of story as the Prioress's Tale, David A. Flory has written, "The Social Uses of Religious Literature: Challenging Authority in the Thirteenth-Century Marian Miracle Tale." Essays in Medieval Studies 13 (1996).
• Daniel T. Kline, "Textuality, Subjectivity, and Violence: Theorizing the Figure of the Child in Middle English Literature."   Essays in Medieval Studies 12 (1995).
• Jane Cowgill, "Chaucer's Missing Children." Essays in Medieval Studies 12 (1995).

7.  Student Projects & Essays

Anniina Jokkinen's strikingly beautiful and highly useful Luminarium includes a substantial list of professional and student essays on a number of medieval authors, and individual pages on, Chaucer, the Gawain Poet, Langland, Margery Kempe, and Julian of Norwich. Jokkinen also compiles a number of resources by Canterbury Tale: The Prioress's Tale

8.  Online Bibliography

9.  Syllabi & Course Descriptions

10.  Images & Multimedia

The Massacre of the Innocents (from Matthew 2) is a subtext of the Prioress's Tale, and images of the Massacre (or Slaughter) of the Innocents are pervasive in medieval culture.  See the following:

• Miniatures des collections de l'Université de Liège
  Psautier de "Lambert le Bègue" (ms. 431), Lettrine Q: le massacre des Innocents

11.  Language Helps & Audio Files

Sample audio files (.wav, .au, .aiff) from the Prioress's Tale, recorded at Campion College, University of Regina, 1989, and at the 7th International Congress of the New Chaucer Society, University of Kent at Canterbury, 1990, are available from the Chaucer Studio (Paul Thomas, Brigham Young).

12. Potpourri

13.  The Next Step